'Jassy's one of the most powerful leaders not just within the cloud and the tech sector but in the world of business.” Key Backgroundīezos said he was stepping down Wednesday to focus on his other interests. 'AWS and Jassy-they're the gatekeepers,' Dan Ives, an analyst at Wedbush Securities, told Insider. © 2024 NYP Holdings, Inc.Jassy hasn’t escaped controversy: He defended AWS’s facial recognition software as critics pressured the company to halt sales to law enforcement, and stated publicly that the Trump administration’s “ disdain” for Amazon contributed to it losing out on the lucrative JEDI military cloud contract last year.

“Given the large size of our workforce and our wide range of businesses and customers, we recognize this transition may take time, but we are confident it will result in long-term benefits to increasing our ability to deliver for our customers, bolstering our culture, and growing and developing employees,” Galetti said in a companywide memo.Īmazon did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for comment. Jassy pushed back, saying a return to the office would build effective collaboration.īeth Galetti, Amazon’s HR chief, then said the return-to-office plan would move forward as scheduled. The petitioners argued for “remote advocacy,” and said that spending mandatory days working from the office went against Amazon’s stances on affordable housing, diversity and climate change. In March, about 30,000 employees went so far as to sign a petition calling on Jassy to retract the hybrid work schedule. The change was immediately met with backlash from employees, who argued they are more productive and enjoy a better work-life balance in a remote work environment.

More than 100,000 Whole Foods workers were also let go. Previously, team leaders could make the call on how often their teams worked remotely.ģ Amazon recently laid off 9,000 workers - just weeks after axing 18,000 jobs. In it, he ordered corporate employees to report to the office at least three days per week. This is far from the first time Amazon workers argued against the retail giant’s return-to-office plan since it went into effect nearly one month ago.Īmazon CEO Andy Jassy announced the plan to made a hybrid work schedule mandatory back in February. “As it pertains to the specific topics this group of employees is raising, we’ve explained our thinking in different forums over the past few months and will continue to do so,” said Amazon spokesperson Rob Munoz. It’s unclear what specific products Amazon Employees for Climate Justice believes were “greenwashed.”Īn Amazon spokesperson told The Post in response to the walkout: “We respect our employees’ rights to express their opinions.”

Greenwashing is a form of advertising where companies make broad sustainability claims about products to get consumers to buy them without sufficient evidence. Getty ImagesĪmazon Employees for Climate Justice cited “failures on the carbon front” and “greenwashing” as reasons for its members to walk off the job on May 31, according to the Times.

3 At least 1,000 Seattle-based Amazon workers will walk off the job as of lunchtime May 31 in an act of protest over layoffs and return-to-office mandates.

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